Just as the “Heading Into The Home Stretch” edition was being beamed up to Frank, our webmaster, the postal service and web server delivered a delightful array of messages. Unfortunately, with a “black and white bush kitty” delivering a smelly spray to our naïve 14 month old golden retriever, skunky cleanup duties took over. Here are the news items submitted from that fateful night of July 26 through to the end of the month…
John continued his diligent tracking of two City Centre nest sites on July 24. In the morning at 41 Princess, John saw 6 entries and 6 exits in 78 minutes – two consecutive entries and, later, two consecutive exits confirmed that feeding non-brooded young was well underway. In the early afternoon at 579 McDermot, the 2 attending adults made simultaneous, or nearly simultaneous (less than a minute apart) entries and exits. There were 4 entries and 4 exits seen in 42 minutes = excellent care giving effort to non-brooded young. All the best for successful fledging at your nest sites John!
On July 25, the St James squad snagged roosting hour counts for all four of their sites. We certainly appreciate the ongoing efforts of these volunteers during the busy summer months! Here is what Jake, Donald, Anna, and Adolf saw:
- Carillon Tower- 3 entries
- Kings Theatre – 3 entries
- 1780 Portage (new site east of the Carillon) – an entry/exit cycle was seen followed by an entry. This appears to be a nest site.
- Assiniboine school – 61-63 roosting; “activity was very similar to that on 21 July: a buildup of the flock whirling over the school beginning at about 9:48 to 9:50.” There were single entries at 9:40 and 9:48 PM, then between 9:50-9:57, the others descended including a “bulk entry of ca. 20 birds”. That is a real challenge to count. It will be interesting to see if any pre-migratory increases start soon at the Assiniboine School roost.
Tim went to check out John’s City Centre William Avenue. site on July 26. The day was sizzling with more than high temperatures – the discovery of new site 2016-15 took place “…while heading back down William I noticed a chimney on 471 William just emerging from the rooftop and a swift overhead. What d’you know, the swift entered at 1310.” Congratulations Tim on identifying yet another active site for the critical habitat registry!
Now Tim might have taken heat in a different fashion, but I hope Chimney Swifts added to the charm of a special anniversary dinner instead of being a distraction…on July 26, swifts were seen regularly from an outdoor patio on Corydon and one descended toward a Dorchester chimney. A post-prandial walk featured 20 swifts flying about Lilac and Grosvenor. Aerial activity over a couple of homes near Edderton Park was particularly “crazy”. If you are in the vicinity, this hot spot appears to be great Chimney Swift habitat.
Joel, in The Pas, had several sightings from June 17 to 23. He saw trio flying – ” 3 swifts together in territorial like chases”. After being out of town, Joel returned to sky gazing on July 7 but no sightings were made until the early evening of July 22 when 1 swift was seen flying “round and round the railway station”. On July 24 another sighting was made ~5:30pm, beyond the west side of town, while fishing (just like going to the Fringe Fest, heading to the fishing hole is a good multi-tasking pastime) – 2 barn swallows and a swift were pursuing a Merlin. What a great value-added sighting. As Joel summed up the 2016 season to date, “The swifts are here somewhere, but time and luck have yet to join forces.” We hope you identify the first active site in The Pas sooner than later!
The troops assembled at St Adolphe for a multi-site robust roosting hour session on July 27 (no Pokémon Gym battles were engaged in). Here is what we found:
Kathy and Rob (and the stinky pup) were at Club Amical –
SE Club Amical: feeding non-brooded young (fledging due August 6-7-8); 2 entry/exit cycles plus 2 roosting entries
NE Club Amical: nest failure site July 16 – feeding non-brooded young, Day 13; 0 entries/exits
Jacquie watched Brodeur Bros: nest failure site July 15 – feeding brooded young, Day 6; 1 roosting entry
Frank and Lewis monitored the non-stop action at the Church: feeding non-brooded young (fledging due July 30-31-Aug 1); 19 entries, 19 exits, and 2 roosting entries together at end of session
Barb looked at the Main St chimney: nest failure site July 16 – possibly feeding brooded young, Day 2; 2 entry/exit cycles; 1 roosting entry
In retrospect, signs of change were evident in St Adolphe. Helpers had not been at the two nest sites for a week and the maximum aerial group size declined from 5-6 to 3 swifts. I was quite shocked, however, to have no swifts roosting at the NE Club and only 1 roosting at Brodeurs and Main St. Way back in the early monitoring years (2007-2010), all the swifts would hang around in St A through August and often form a pre-migratory group at the Church or another successful site. In more recent years, unsuccessful breeders would stay through the first week of August at least – once a fledging took place at some site, unsuccessful breeders seemed “cued” for release and then they left the community.
Margaret and Millie’s site in Brandon gave us the first indication of early withdrawal/relocation for unsuccessful breeding birds in 2016. They had reported 0 roosting swifts on both July 18 and 24.
The million dollar question is “where are these unsuccessful breeders going?”
Tim was following a hunch again on July 28 while “passing the Flag Shop this evening and thought I would stop and take a look on the off chance of activity. Turns out it was a good decision. About a minute after leaving the car at 7:29, a swift enters the chimney. Approximately 30-40 seconds later a swift left, swiftly followed by another about 15 seconds later.” This site has been in our database since 2007, routinely has a small number of occupants, and is likely a nest site.
As noted in our previous blog, Margaret and Millie were planning a trip to Souris. They visited on July 28, after checking their line of bluebird nesting boxes ~ another great volunteer activity! A group of 12 Chimney Swifts were flying around which was a welcome sight. Margaret and Millie “drove around and found the chimneys where swifts had been seen and spent some time at the museum and the Rock Shop hoping to see an entry. No luck. We did see swifts high in the sky while in the vicinity of the museum but most of the action happened between 7:30 & 8:45 in the vicinity of St Paul’s United Church, Kowalchuk’s Funeral Home, and west. The swifts were flying low and quite vocal – none appeared to be taking any food to any young!” Thanks so much for your recon report Margaret and Millie. The situation in Souris merits further monitoring, so we would appreciate suggestions for local volunteers who might be recruited.
Jake was at his 94 Roslyn Rd site on the evening of July 29. He saw 6 entry/exit cycles then 2 roosting entries – fledging is at hand!
Ken and Jan, up in Dauphin, were also out for the roosting hour on July 29. One swift appeared 20 minutes into the session, then at the 45 minute mark, “swoosh – a whole bunch” showed up. Two swifts entered followed rapidly by 17 more; 1 swift was in the air at the end of the monitoring session (19 roosted; 20 seen). Ken’s impression was that the large group of swifts could be a migratory group. The solstice head count in Dauphin was 4-6 seen in the air. The northern swifts seem to be on the move…
Gord and Janice took on a special assignment, heading to Manitou on July 29. Remember the backstory that Ken had identified swifts in this community during his July 4 recon. Janice and Gord’s time was well spent as they discovered new site 2016-16 – 338 Hamilton St, St Andrews United Church. During the robust roosting hour session, 4 Chimney Swifts were seen in the air and all 4 roosted in the Church chimney.
Moving ahead one day and onto the final stage of nesting, I am happy to announce that fledglings were seen mid-morning of Saturday, July 30 at the St Adolphe Church. On the previous morning, many “strafing run” approaches to the chimney were seen plus adults were dropping down then veering off close to the rim. I interpreted the behaviour to be what the Kyle’s describe as adults luring the juveniles close to the top of the chimney just prior to fledging.
On Saturday morning, the identification of a fledgling could not have been easier – I sat in my chair and stared up, only to have a low, slow flying swift oblige me with an easy view of its trailing wing margin. It was INTACT – no moulting discontinuities were seen. After watching groups of birds fly around the area and seeing escorted, cautious but competent entries into the chimney (no tumbling misses), I realized that these were not first-flights. My best guesstimate is that 2, perhaps 3, fledglings were airborne sometime on Friday, July 29 AFTER I finished monitoring for the morning OR fledging had taken place very early on the morning of the 30th.
Checking in St A again during the morning of July 31, I saw 2 juveniles jostle for position during their near simultaneous entries to the Church. Good news continued as the SE Club Amical young were being fed; at Day 22, the juveniles should have been out of the bowl of the nest and onto the wall of the chimney. That boded well for the severe storms which were predicted to finish off July’s awful weather events…Rob and I managed an evening session at the Church on July 31 – we saw a juvenile in flight and the roosting count was 3. In a few days, another robust roosting hour count should help confirm the number of fledglings at the Church; juveniles often head into the chimney to rest well ahead of the roosting hour curfew so it can take up to a week to get an accurate census.
Garry also checked out his Watt Street nest site on July 31. It was a profitable trip as Garry noticed entries which were “slower, less-direct, more horizontal approach, with a very brief stall at the rim”. Fledging has taken place likely! Thanks Garry for tracking this site over the season – it is useful to gauge the breeding success of Chimney Swifts throughout Manitoba to understand the provincial situation.
Frank & Jacquie, Tim, and Lewis took to the road for a multi-site recon at Otterburne on July 31. Jacquie and Frank have wondered about the convent and church sites across the river from Providence College. Jacquie and Tim became blood donors to a flock of mosquitoes while they watched swift-free air space. Lewis and Frank had a civilized monitoring session, replete with classical music. Their monitoring results for the three Providence College chimneys – relative to previous sessions – are:
Site 550 – chimney near bell tower: 2 roosting on July 18 and 0 roosting on July 31; there was never any real nest building activity noted by the end of June, so I would say that a breeding attempt was never underway. There they are gone.
Site 551 – fat chimney: 11 entries, 5 exits and 6 in for the night on July 18 = an unusual (ok, weird) number of birds for a nest site, but too much activity for a typical roost; there were 4 entries and 3 exits and 3 in the chimney on July 31. Net loss = 3 swifts. Should we designate this as a roost site for 2016 and consider that some birds have dispersed? Another monitoring session would be useful to figure out what is going on.
Site 552 – skinny chimney: 12 entries, 8 exits, and 4 roosting for the night on July 18 = breeding pair + 2 helpers? OR a small roost?; there were 13 entries, 12 exits, and 3 roosting for the night on July 31.There were three instances of 2 entries and 2 exits occurring very close together – more so than on July 18. Given the date, high level of activity, and clumping sequences, fledging may be at hand…however, juveniles were not obvious…this does appear to be a nest site, so a follow-up monitoring session within the next 10 days would be useful.
Frank and Jacquie are planning another trip to Otterburne to help decode the end of July activity. Good luck!
That’s a wrap for July – thanks everyone for such a strong monitoring push this past week.
August may not be a full month with Chimney Swifts in Manitoba after all. We have had indications of early withdrawal of unsuccessful breeding swifts from nest sites. The northern most roost is approaching a secondary pre-migratory peak for the season.
Many questions remain about the current Chimney Swift activity at both nest and roost sites. As usual, the swifts lure us to monitor yet one more time…
Barb for the MCSI team: Frank Machovec, webmaster; Tim Poole, Habitat Stewardship and Outreach Coordinator; Christian Artuso, Ron Bazin, Neil Butchard, Lewis Cocks, Ken De Smet, Nicole Firlotte, and Rob Stewart, Steering Committee Members.